X
by faktory
Summary: A princess, a tattooist, and the preservation of a shibboleth. – [Post-Alabasta Arc, Vivi-centric.]


**notes:** spontaneous idea, spontaneous fic. inspired partly by someone who got the one piece x-mark tattooed on his arm irl, and also by the fact that the world needs more fics about vivi in general.

 **warnings:** absolutely none, for once!

* * *

She's well and truly naked, now. The bathwater washes away the last dregs of ink until there's nothing left to show but skin. Somewhat jarred by the absence, she traces out a memory of its shape, her fingers ghosting a criss-cross into the place where it once was. What a strange turn of her soul, that she feels so utterly disturbed to see the bareness of her wrist. She wonders what else about her has come away from all of this, changed.

With a heavy sigh, she flips her forearm to stare instead at the creasing of her palm. And old arithmetic tutor of hers had once taught her to read the future as it was written in those lines, but she's long since forgotten how. If she could reach into that clouded past and steal the knowledge back, she would; any hint of days to come would be nice, at this point, no matter how dodgy or vague. It's not that she's scared, or regretful, or anything like that. She just wishes that there were a way to move forward without letting go. Which, admittedly, might be something of a foolish pursuit—but she has always been a fool for her own heart.

 _Well,_ she thinks, _maybe things will be clearer in the morning._

So she puts it out of mind, for the night, and sleeps. It comes easily, with dreams of the sun in the sand and the sun on the sea; her gains and her losses. And sure enough, come morning, Vivi knows exactly what she has to do.

* * *

The tattooist is old, broad-shouldered and wide-eyed, although the latter seems more a consequence of the set of her face than any particular display of shock. Her ragged state of dress looks out of place in the throne room of the royal palace, but she holds herself with a certain air that speaks to being a master of her craft. Which is, purportedly, exactly what she is. Best in all the land, so they say.

Vivi thinks that the need of such skill might be a bit excessive for something so simple, but she understands that there is a certain degree of prestige and politicization inherent in even the most menial tasks, when one is the princess of a nation. And simple though this task may be, it is anything but menial.

She asks the elderly woman to rise from her genuflection; it feels somehow disrespectful to close this sort of conversation as anything but equals. After all, this is the person to which she'll be entrusting a piece of her truth. "Do you accept, then?"

"I would be honored, Your Majesty."

* * *

She watches the needle drive itself into her skin, over and over, each point a shred of blackness threading together to take shape and gain life. The pain isn't so bad; compared to some of the wounds she'd incurred as Miss Wednesday, it's hardly worth mentioning, really. More than anything, she wonders on the slow precision of the process, wholly unlike the haphazard haste with which she'd first drawn the mark on herself. Perhaps it's symbolic, poetic, or maybe ironic—the exact nature of the juxtaposition escapes her.

The tattooist glances up from her work, stopping respectfully short of meeting Vivi's eyes. "You're a tougher make than most, Your Majesty," she says, in a voice torn somewhere between deference and genuine respect. "I've seen hardened sailors thrice your size blanch at the mere sight of my needle, but you hardly seem bothered at all!"

"Hardened sailors, huh?" Vivi smiles at that, a little secretly, as the woman turns back to continue from where she'd left off. "I can only imagine."

* * *

Something visceral has been returned to her, and she simply isn't able to say thanks enough in material goods or material words. Instead, she ends up rambling away with her gratitude, grasping the tattooist's hands in her own and telling her the story of the cross and how it came to mean so much—albeit in as vague way as possible, and with a good deal of omissions where necessary. After all, putting anyone else at risk, be it the nakama she'd left behind or the countrymen for which she'd done so, is the last thing she wants to come of what she shares.

Because once she starts talking, she recognizes that these words have been building up inside of her for far too long, dammed by duty, by secrecy, by all number of walls and weights. But this isn't the kind of story that she's meant to keep to herself. Memories of adventure and experience survive in the tales told by those who've lived them; that's just the way of the world, she supposes.

Vivi still has a lot to learn about the way of the world, but she's getting there.

* * *

The afternoon sun stands above her like a fist in the sky. Its light washes over her skin, over the tender _x_ inked nakedly into her body. She traces its shape, her fingers echoing the line of a criss-cross that aches down to the bone in the place where the skin-deep marker had been first. Whatever she'd gained, whatever she'd lost…those pasts have been made flesh, and so she stands a little taller, now that she is free to carry them inside of her rather than simply leave them behind.

The tattoo is not a replica of its predecessor. Its lines are sharper, its color runs deeper. But all of that is no concern of hers; so long as it carries the same spirit, it remains the same in body. Vivi doesn't generally concern herself with the physicality of things, least not when they pertain to herself. Princess or not, the desert and the sea alike have taught hard and fast that form must only follow function, and she is nothing if not a model student. Because of this, she knows that she is not mistaken in the meaning of things. This image is a vessel, not a symbol. It embodies the memory of a shibboleth but not the shibboleth itself—for it'd already lost any purpose as such when it was removed from the kindred that it signified.

But Vivi is not sad to see it through a frame of the past. She doesn't have to be, now that memory no longer means the threat of being forgotten. In fact, she thinks it might be of more use to her now than it had ever been before. It's an eternal life, to be remembered, and there is no better way to honor things loved and lost than to keep loving them as though they never left.

That night, she dreams of a tomorrow she doesn't yet know―but come morning, she will face it like she does.

* * *

 **end notes:** i think this could technically still be canon, considering that (i'm reasonably sure) we never actually see the back of vivi's left wrist at any point in her post-alabasta appearances in the manga.

concrit is welcome, as always. bear in mind i wrote this almost entirely in the middle of the night, though, so it's hardly my best work.


End file.
